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Creating an SEO Report that your Clients Will Love

SEO firms are driven by their motivation to formulate a viable link-building strategy, crawl sites for SEO issues and improvise on competitor tactics and rankings; but clients don’t care about all that except for one thing- the results they see in their SEO report!

For a business owner, the best SEO report is one where there’s a clear indication of how much of their web presence has improved. However, as an SEO specialist, you know that neither results nor profits are guaranteed even when improved rankings are achieved. This is a burden faced by most SEO firms. As an SEO specialist, you need to demonstrate to your clients why should they hire you. This is where an SEO report can help bridge the gap.

This post will address the goals and standard metrics you should cover in your report and unveil the best practices to adopt so that you can create an SEO report your clients will love.

What does your client want to see in an SEO report?

The purpose of implementing SEO strategies is to get the client’s website on top in search engines for target keywords. Your strategy will be based on a plan you’ve specifically developed for the client. However, while you are reporting, don’t discuss the specifics of your plan. Work on a report that provides an overview of your strategies and the results it achieves. Focus on the goals and important metrics that influence your client’s revenue.

Consider including the following in your SEO report:

Keyword Ranking

This metric starts with identifying which keywords are valuable to the client’s business. Then you need to track the movement of these keywords; whether they’re going up or down along with keeping a track of the efficacy of your strategies. Don’t focus on daily shifts and certainly do not report these to the client either. Report on actionable items such as keyword search volumes to your clients.

Organic Traffic

These are directly related to organic search rankings. Factors such as rich cards and rich snippets help maximize the CTR you can achieve on SERPs. Observe the best practices and complete metadata segments with fascinating content.

Average time spent on the site

Chances are, mentioning this metric in your SEO report can raise a few eyebrows. The amount of time a visitor spends on your client’s website is a vital statistic. If the visitors are engaged, they tend to stay longer and click on additional pages. If they exit quickly, the chances are that there may be issues with content quality, formatting or page loading speed.

Bounce Rate

This metric shows the percentage of visitors who made brief visits to a single page on the client’s website. The bounce rate quantifies visitor engagement. Your goal is to encourage visitors to click on other links on the site so that the chances of converting them into a sale are higher.

Goal Conversion

Your client may have specific pages that they want to be optimized. For this, you need to create conversion goals. This will help you determine which actions to take in order to improve how your clients must meet their end goals.

Earned Links

Link building continues to be a big determinant of search rankings. However, it may be difficult to explain link building to clients. Focus on explaining why obtaining links from certain sites are more valuable than others. Include the following criteria in your SEO report:

– Trust signals- does the site have good metrics?

– Referral Traffic

– Conversion Rate, etc.

Including the above-mentioned metrics is one way to create an SEO report that your clients will love. Another way to achieve the same is adhering to simple formatting and presentation guidelines.

Which are some of the best practices you should adopt in your SEO report?

Most SEO firms create an SEO template from where they can build an SEO report. The following best practices will help you create an effective SEO report:

Keep the report short and sweet

Maintain the client’s focus on the goals. Adhere to the main points. Present complementary information only as required.

Include Actionable Items

Keep the client updated on their SEO performance regardless of how well it’s doing. Include details about your next steps and express to the client that you are committed to moving towards success.

Include Visuals

Visuals, especially colored images will help your clients process the information in your SEO report. It provides a necessary break between all the data and text that you are presenting. In addition, the human brain processes visual information faster than written information, which can help your client understand what you’re trying to communicate.

An SEO report is the lifeline of a digital marketing agency. By including parameters such as bounce rate, keyword rankings, etc. and adhering to certain best practices, you can easily create an SEO report that your clients will love!